Here we are again…another year ending. Time for reflection. Time for the yearly recap…Time for another year-end clearance. Every December 31st the ritual begins. Out with the old, in with the new…the new…the new. Is it really going to be a new year? Or just a rehashing of the old year brought into the New Year?

Looking back on the year 2017, and remembering some of my adventures on my journey through the past twelve months, I recall an incident which occurred on December 5th. A co-worker instigated what was called later, a “verbal altercation.”

The saddest part of what I witnessed was that the person he approached was blamed for the incident he escalated due to his agitation, lack of focus and insensitivity to their feelings. It came out later that he was indeed not on the same page as the person had told him. I watched him become increasingly defensive when that was brought to his attention.

I watched as this young man rallied his coworkers to defend his behavior. They did, painting him as the victim and the other person as the abrasive and loud perpetrator who attacked and embarrassed him, without reason.

The crowning blow of this travesty was their director. She never asked the person who was really the victim their side of the story. The true victim sent an email to the director saying that she had a conversation with the young man, there seemed to be some confusion, and asked to discuss the incident with her… The director ignored her email and approached the young man who initiated the “verbal altercation”, the coworkers, and others, outside of the department, never once approaching the recipient of the young man’s agitation and escalation, and began to build a “stereo-typical” event of character displays always present, in people of color.

The young man, who is a supervisor, had a conversation with me and disclosed that he was under a lot of pressure and overwhelmed by his duties, and didn’t have time for much else, which distressed him. He admitted to me that he wasn’t on the same page as the coworker he confronted, however, there were things that were mentioned by the person, like their job description, which he felt was inappropriate. He had mentioned his job description and saw nothing wrong with it, but found fault with his coworker using it to clarify a job duty in their “conversation.”

The coworker, who was going to resign due to lack of work next year, tendered their resignation after a meeting with the director, who would not listen to the employee’s story of what happened, and started to ‘create justifications’ involving the person as changes in their behavior!

The person who resigned was a person of color, and an older female. The young man involved was not a person of color. This story is detrimental to our year-end clearance…

My credentials include being a Legal Redress Chair for the NAACP, and a Board Member of the ACLU. As such, my training has given me specific criteria in determining human and civil rights violations. I also witnessed in this workplace, a female coworker, not of color, create dissention between her and several coworkers and a director of an adjoining department, and she was given the benefit of the doubt, and mentored by the same director who shutout the older female person of color, until the director of the adjoining department barred this employee from working on any projects from her department, shutting down the workflow to the offensive employee.

This incident culminated last December 2016. The director gave the disruptive employee time to look for another job, keeping her through Christmas, and when she found a job in early January 2017, she allowed the employee to resign, rather than being fired.

The employee of color resigned on December 7th, two days after the alleged verbal altercation she was named as having instigated, without any support from her director or her “team” which she faithfully supported.

Out with the old…in with the new. If we do not examine ourselves and truly work on real change, by changing the old which define our actions, as well as ourselves…new years will never be new…just rehashing the old, destructive elements which divide and conquer humanity; laying waste to any possibilities of peace on earth…goodwill toward all…and a planet attempting to heal from ongoing wars and the constant onslaught of depletion and pollution of her resources.

Clear out the old…this is the moment of your “year-end clearance.” Hold back nothing. Clean the slate, don’t just “clear it.” Be true to yourself and work on breaking old habits and destructive beliefs, and work on and welcome change… Until we genuinely work on ridding our hearts, minds and spirits of that which “steals, kills and destroys,” new years will come and go without much more than ritual fanfare…without much hope…with ongoing excessive, old baggage being rearranged under the guise of “new.”

Walk into the New Year…don’t trip into it…don’t fall into it…your year-end clearance is now…Tomorrow is a new year, Embrace it with a renewed you! It all begins with you…

On second thought, JUMP!!!

God has given all of us the gift of free-will…with free-will, we can create…Let us create a new future, beginning with this new year…

Peace…Love…Change…Brotherhood of Humanity…Protect our Planet…we are ready…we are receptive…

Enter, 2018…we are NEW, we welcome you!!!

God Bless us all…everyone and everything which gives us the ability to be Bringers of Light and Change…and Love.